Hildegard of Bingen was a prominent German Christian mystic, polymath and abbess during the Middle Ages. She is also known as Saint Hildegard and is known for her visionary theology and her subsequent great influence on Christianity.

Born in 1098 in Bingen, a city located somewhere in the northern parts of Germany near Mainz. One of many siblings, her parents noticed the prophetic gift early in her life. She was just 8 years old when they placed her in Disibodenberg, a benedictine monastery where she lived for nearly 40 years.

Hildegard is best known for her visions, visions which she was gifted or tormented with, depending on how you look at it because she was indeed bedridden sometimes due to these visions, for about half of her life. In her visions, she was shown how the world was intricately structured and connected, where she described how at the core of existence was the Light, and that Viriditas, the life-giving green light permeated and was responsible for upholding the natural world that we see around us. Hildegard passed away in the year 1179 at the age of 81.

In this article I’ve decided to honour the luminous being in Hildegard by sharing some of her most graceful quotes.

The soul is symphonic.
Hildegard of Bingen (Quoted in Illuminations of Hildegard of Bingen)

Divinity is aimed at humanity.
Hildegard of Bingen (Quoted in Meditations with Hildegard of Bingen, 1983)

O trinity, you are music, you are life.
Hildegard of Bingen (Quoted in Illuminations of Hildegard of Bingen)

I welcome all the creatures of the world with grace.
Hildegard of Bingen (Quoted in Meditations with Hildegard of Bingen, 1983)

The aims of human acts cannot be hidden from God’s knowledge
Hildegard of Bingen (Scivias, 1152)

All of creation is a symphony of the Holy Spirit which is joy and jubilation.
Hildegard of Bingen (Quoted in Meditations with Hildegard of Bingen, 1983)

The more one learns about that which one knows nothing of, the more one gains in wisdom.
Hildegard of Bingen

I, a mere female and fragile vessel, speak these things not from me but from a serene Light.
Hildegard of Bingen (Scivias, 1152)

The soul that is full of wisdom is saturated with the spray of a bubbling fountain – God himself.
Hildegard of Bingen (Quoted in Meditations with Hildegard of Bingen, 1983)

I reach out my hand to God that He may carry me along as a feather is borne weightlessly by the wind…
Hildegard of Bingen (Scivias, 1152)

Love abounds in all things, excels from the depths to beyond the stars, is lovingly disposed to all things.
Hildegard of Bingen (Caritas Abundat)

May my voice never fall into forgetfulness among you; may it rather be heard often in the midst of your love.
Hildegard of Bingen (Letter to her sisters about her own mortality)

The Word is living, being, spirit, all verdant greening, all creativity. This Word manifests itself in every creature.
Hildegard of Bingen

A human being is a vessel that God has built for himself and filled with his inspiration so that his works are perfected in it.
Hildegard of Bingen (Letter to Elisabeth of Schönau, 1152)

Who can obscure the Beginning and the End, Who is, was and will remain? And what are you, who area spark among ashes? And what did you know when you were nothing?
Hildegard of Bingen (Scivias: Book One – Vision 4, 1152)

All living creatures are sparks from the radiation of God’s brilliance, and these sparks emerge from God like the rays of the sun. If God did not give off these sparks, how would the divine flame become fully visible?
Hildegard of Bingen (Scivias, 1152)

The marvels of God are not brought forth from one’s self. Rather, it is more like a chord, a sound that is played. The tone does not come out of the chord itself, but rather, through the touch of the Musician. I am, of course, the lyre and harp of God’s kindness.
Hildegard of Bingen (Quoted in Illuminations of Hildegard of Bingen)

God desires
that all the world
be pure in his sight.
The earth should not be injured.
The earth should not be destroyed.
Hildegard of Bingen (Quoted in Meditations with Hildegard of Bingen, 1983)

I, the fiery life of divine essence, am aflame beyond the beauty of the meadows. I gleam in the waters. I burn in the sun, moon, and stars. With every breeze, as with invisible life that contains everything, I awaken everything to life. I am the breeze that nurtures all things green. I encourage blossoms to flourish with ripening fruits. I am the rain coming from the dew that causes the grasses to laugh with the joy of life.
Hildegard of Bingen (Scivias, 1152)

The devil keeps man from good with a thousand machinations spewed from his belly, so that when a person sighs to do good, he pierces him with his shafts; and when he desires to embrace God with his whole heart in love, he subjects him to poisonous tribulations, seeking to pervert good work before God. And when a person seeks the viridity of virtue, the devil tells him that he does not know what he is doing, and he teaches him that he can set his own law for himself.
Hildegard of Bingen (Letter to an Abbot, c. 1166)

When in the fullness of its time
this creation wilts,
its vigor returns to its own source.
This is the underlying natural law.
When the elements of the world fulfill their function,
they come to ripeness
and their fruit is gathered back to God.
Hildegard of Bingen (Quoted in Meditations with Hildegard of Bingen, 1983)

O Beloved,
your way of knowing is amazing!
The way you recognize every creature
even before it appears.
The way you gaze into the face
of every human being
and see all your works gazing back at you.
O what a miracle
to be awake inside your breathing.
Hildegard of Bingen (Symphonia Caelestium)

I compare
the great love
of Creator and creation
to the same love and fidelity
with which God
binds woman and man
together.
This is so
that together
they might be creatively fruitful
Hildegard of Bingen (Quoted in Meditations with Hildegard of Bingen, 1983)

O Eternal God, now may it please you
to burn in love
so that we become the limbs
fashioned in the love you felt
when you begot your Son
at the first dawn
before all creation.
And consider this need which falls upon us,
take it from us for the sake of your Son,
and lead us to the joy of your salvation.
Hildegard of Bingen (O Eterne Deus: Oh Eternal God)

How wonderful
is the wisdom
in the God-head’s heart.
It is the heart that sees
the primordial eternity
of every creature.
When God gazes upon the countenance
of humankind,
the face that he moulded,
he contemplates this creation
in its entirety,
its totality in this human form.
How wonderful is this breath then,
this breath that awakened humankind.
Hildegard of Bingen (Symphonia Caelestium)